A couple weeks ago I met my friend Martha for lunch at our local Red Robin. Martha is quite particular in her food choices which is why we always meet for lunch there. In the last four years I have known her, she has never ordered something other than a cheeseburger without the cheese. And apparently Red Robin happens to have the best cheese-less cheeseburger in Oklahoma. (I wouldn’t know, I’m more of a California Burger or Pita Wrap kind of gal). While we were sitting enjoying our burgers, fries, and discussing our careers and family lives, I realized the connection.

• Resumes are subjective. So are cheeseburgers, hamburgers, boca burgers, etc. Some hiring managers prefer an objective, others are particular about a cover letter, and some have no opinion whatsoever. I once had a hiring manager who would not interview any candidate who misspelled a state abbreviation. If you were a candidate with the right credentials but accidentally wrote Missouri’s state abbreviation as MI instead of MO, you were out of luck. So proofread, pay attention to details, and make sure to cover all your bases.
• Preferences matter. Because recruiters, hiring managers, and human resource professionals spend approximately 10-15 seconds skimming your resume, you need to make a great first impression. What is extremely important is to read the job description and understand the specific instruction outlined as to how to apply. Some applications request that you list your salary expectations while others do not. These guidelines are extremely important.
• Go bold or go home. Some hiring managers like burgers that sizzle. It is important to consider what style, format, and type of resume that is acceptable for your industry, position, or company you are applying for. For example, Jeff Nelson is a marketing director with a very creative and unusual resume. I located his resume after doing a keyword search on Google using the words, “hamburger resume.” Some companies want a little spice with colorful graphics, fonts, and formats while more conservative companies and industries prefer a more standardized format like Guy Macon’s, an electrical engineer which I found using the keyword search “my engineering resume.” Both these examples were found on the first page of the Google keyword search and illustrate how powerful resumes and keywords are when posting your resume online.
• Stay positive & focused. Not every cheeseburger is someone’s favorite, and not every resume appeals to every hiring manager. What is important is to be yourself and articulate your uniqueness and experiences through your resume. Stay inward focused, but look for ways to improve your plating & presentation skills by refining your resume, cover letter, or even your interview. As a candidate, you are focused on yourself and can fail to see the ingredients or characteristics that attract others. Ask people you trust, heed expert advice and get outside opinions to help you refine your recipe.

Photo Credit FindaLink

Jessica Miller-Merrell, SPHR is an author, new mother, and human resources professional with a passion for recruiting and all things social media.  She has over 10 years of experience in human resources & recruiting.

Her company, Xceptional HR provides businesses with social media, recruitment, and human resources strategy and consulting.   Jessica’s book, Tweet This! Twitter for Business will be released in February 2010.  Follow Jessica on Twitter, LinkedIn, & FaceBook.

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Applying for jobs is not only time consuming, it is probably one of the most nerve-racking experiences ever.  You’ve spent hours if not days compiling materials just to put into your resume, you now have to move on to the cover letter, then after you’ve probably stressed yourself beyond reason you have to write them an e-mail! Now the question is, are you just creating carbon copy replicas of each of the priors or are you creating a written masterpiece? Each one building off of the last, creating the perfect picture of who you are.

The Resume

Your resume is the base layer, the primer of this portrait. It is what everything else is built on.  Your resume will have the essentials, who you are, how to get a hold of you, where you’ve worked, what you’ve done and various skills you possess.  This is not the time to try and focus on who you are.  Granted you can show pieces of your personality through layout and design, there’s time for that later.  The resume is just meant to give the base structure but definitely don’t be afraid to have a little fun with it, because it could definitely help with getting it (and you) noticed.

The Cover Letter

You’ve laid the base, now you can start working on the big picture. Don’t just repeat the same things you did in your resume. Take what you had in your resume and elaborate, bring it to life. Give stunning visuals of what you’ve done and don’t forget to say how it can benefit the company – they like it when you do that. Here is where you really get to shine and show who you are and what you bring to the table so truly don’t hold back, create something that is awe-inspiring and will land you the job of the century.

The E-Mail

By now you’re probably worn out, brain is toast and you’re out of inspiration. Don’t fret. Just stick it out a little longer and finish this masterpiece. The e-mail is where you will put all the finishing touches on all of the main points you’ve worked so hard to create. Give a quick reason as to why they should open your attachments and continue reading, what is it that makes you so appealing? Don’t forget to thank them in advance and once again, provide all of your contact information, you can never have that in too many places.  What good would it be if you did all this work and they couldn’t contact you?  Now, click send.

The Portrait as a Whole

When you’ve constructed your resume, cover letter and e-mail to the company you’re applying to it is truly a time for admiration. You need to check, recheck and triple check every detail of this process to ensure its perfection.  Like all art, it takes practice to be perfect but when you add your own personal flare to it and maintain optimism – you will succeed!

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In a highly competitive job market the professional resume cover letter becomes even more vital as it is the “sales pitch” of your personal brand. It is the initial introduction to the senior partner and (hopefully) future colleagues. In it, one must be honest, direct, and precise. Think of the type of person that would be the most trustworthy and comfortable for you to do business with. It will not be the loud, flashy car salesman that dresses poorly and promises the moon without being able to deliver. Include personality in the writing, but be sure it presents a confident, polished picture of professionalism. If the reader does not like a cover letter, he or she may not even bother to glance at the resume. These are good ideas to bear in mind before you begin.

8 steps to write a professional resume cover letter:

1. Do not use ploys to garner attention. “Do you know why I should be hired? Because I’m the best . . . .” Does that question sound professional, and leave you anxiously wanting to read on? Probably not. The employer is expecting interesting, not hokey.
2. Be informed about the company. Know to whom the letter should be addressed (call and ask if necessary) and double-check that the company name is listed correctly. A fast way to ruffle feathers is to mess up the business’s name. If it’s a magazine, read it. If it’s a marketing company, Google its most recent activities. This will help when deciding what relevant personal experiences to include.
3. Relate your experience to the employer’s needs. One might wonder how exactly a summer job as a cashier at a local retailer has any correlation to an entry level position as an HR representative for a large company. List a specific example of applicable skills learned while a cashier. Mentioning the time that a non-English speaking individual needed assistance and how you, being bilingual, were able to appease the customer by doing x, y, and z would be one example.
4. Show specifically how you can help their business team. Avoid the common mistake of writing a generic style, fill-in-the-blank cover letter. Chances are, it will not even get read. If the ad lists a specific problem that needs to be addressed then be bold and creative and suggest what you would do with problem x to make it disappear.
5. Keep it interesting. You must use a professional tone, but that does not mean using stale, passive language. Write active sentences such as: I instructed a group of 15, I wrote 2 2,000 word articles a week, or I lead the production team of 22 to record profits of 23%. Using action verbs gives readers an impression of the writer’s self-confidence.
6. Don’t sound artificial or contrived. Would you walk up to a brand new acquaintance and bombard them with unnecessarily long words? People would leave not only unimpressed, but would perceive you as arrogant. After employers sift through hundreds of resumes, they do not want to read something unnecessarily complicated.
7. Stick to the point and be brief. If every little fantastic attribute and experience is discussed, then the employer will not only get tired of reading it, but also not need to learn more about you. Choose to include only the most relevant examples and skills. The idea is to leave the reader wanting to know more about your experience, and how you can help their company.
8. Be proactive. End the cover letter with a statement that shows that you will follow up with the company to schedule a convenient appointment for an interview. This shows that you are serious enough about the position to put in extra effort in the hiring process.

Every professional resume cover letter you write is about explaining how your personal brand can help a company grow and improve. First impressions are vitally important, and although not impossible, a negative impression will be difficult to overcome. Use this opportunity to make an outstanding self-presentation that gets you to the next step – the interview.

Bethany Stringer is a graduate of Texas A&M University (class of ‘08) and has her B.A. in English Literature with minors in History and Psychology. Writing her first story at the age of 5 (with help from Mom), Bethany still enjoys writing and researching about everything from business and history to travel and fiction. Enamored with languages, she plans to teach English in Russia in 2010 as a CELTA certified teacher. She owned her own business working horses when she was 17, and still loves riding her horse Romeo. Always appreciating a challenge, she loves sea kayaking and prefers Rachmaninov to Bach.

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I was browsing through a few dozen resumes today, and I noticed some common mistakes. I thought I’d share with you some professional resume tips to help you to learn from their mistakes.

Below are the professional resume tips you should take away from each mistake:

1. Use the body of your email to sell yourself

Actual Example: Someone emailed me their resume saying: “I’m a current graduate student at [school]. I would like to apply for the [open position]. The attachment is my one-page resume. I hope to have further contact with you in the future. Thanks.”

Analysis: Is this a human or a robot? The body of the email is both uninformative and abrupt. For all I know, they used that exact text to apply for a job at McDonald’s. I get no sense of who the applicant is. Ask yourself: what will make me want to open your resume if I have dozens of others to go through?

The Fix: Treat your email body like a cover letter.

In the body of your email, give me something that makes me want to learn more about you.

Treat your email like a cover letter by introducing yourself in a moving way. Make me think: ah… this is a real, likable person. I want to learn more about what they can do for me.

Be concise and make sure you:

1. Demonstrate that you get things done by identifying a few concrete tasks you completed or quantifiable change you brought to related projects.
2. Demonstrate your passion by describing how this position relates to what excites you in life.

2. Send your resume as a PDF

PDF files can be viewed on all computers, regardless of operating system or software version. It would be silly to send me a .docx if there’s any chance I can’t open it.

Never send your resume as a .docx file. Hiring managers will not take the time to convert your resume to a .doc so they can read it. (Many don’t even know how). When you have lots of applicants, it just doesn’t make sense to waste time converting dozens of resumes.

Always. Send. A. PDF. Otherwise, it may never get opened.

3. Name your resume like this:  “[First] [Last] Resume.pdf”

Imagine you’re a hiring manager for a moment. You have a folder full of resumes on your hard drive. You have too many applicants to remember their names. Wouldn’t you want your resumes to have consistent file names – one single naming system so you can quickly see exactly whose resume is whose, alphabetically?

It’s always a breath of fresh air when I don’t have to manually change the filename of your resume. And every breath of fresh air I get when dealing with your resume, the more I like you. It’s probably unfair, but when dealing with dozens of applicants, that’s just not something I want to have to deal with.

The bottom line is that every time you make my life easier, you score points in my book. So name your resume: First Last Resume.pdf.

4. Use bold text to emphasize your most important points

Hiring managers don’t have much time to make decisions. That’s why in your email body, you should put your most important points in bold. The items that will win you the job should jump off the screen.

One applicant today took the time to bold each company name and position he held in the body of his email. This made it easier for me to scan his text, filter out the noise and hone in on his credentials. Before I began reading through his email, I could already see where he’d worked. And after I finished, the bold text still stood out, reminding me again of his credentials. He successfully emphasized his most important points to me.

How can you use bold to strengthen the text of your email?

5. Include concrete actions and quantifiable results. Vagueness is a deal-breaker!

The more vague you are about what you’ve done, the less I care.

This is weak: “Worked on Project X,” or “Led Project Y.”

How do I know what you did on Project X? Or what results you achieved? What does it mean to lead Project Y? What did you actually do?

This is strong: “Identified and reported 27 bugs per day testing Software X,” or “Developed complete end-user requirements for Project Y based on 15 two-hour customer interviews.”

This tells me you actually did something. Concreteness is your best friend. If your bullet points make me clearly imagine you doing a specific task, then I can picture you working at my company.

Vagueness is your enemy. If you use broad verbs that don’t describe specific actions, then I can’t picture you working at my company. I don’t care if you “oversaw” or “worked on” something. That means diddly to me. What did you actually do?

This is weak: “Responsible for new client acquisition.”

“Responsible for” is too vague. So is “oversaw.”

You were responsible for new client acquisition, but did you actually do it? That doesn’t tell me what you really did. Nor does it quantify the results you achieved.

This is strong: “Cold-called 50 potential clients a week, converting 10% into paying customers.”

That’s much better. It tells me exactly what you did. I can picture you on the phone, chatting it up with prospective customers, winning over new clients and increasing my company’s bottom line.

6. Include two or three quotes from good references.

Everybody says “references available upon request.”

To stand out, actively insert two or three “testimonials” from people you’ve worked with. It can be a past bosses, co-workers, project teammates or even professors. Keep each quote under three sentences. Make sure they concretely support your greatest strengths.

This is weak: “John was a great teammate to work with on our Project X.”

This says nothing about what John is good at. Vague verbs like “great” or “excellent” don’t tell me anything about John. What is John specifically great at? Sometimes a brief story is the most effective way to illustrate your strengths.

This is strong: “We hired John after our last programmer left us four weeks behind schedule. John’s ability to consistently meet coding deadlines under high pressure helped put us back on schedule. He was a hard-working and invaluable member of our team.” Or, “John’s ability to connect emotionally with our customers made him our second most highly-rated customer service rep. He always left our users with a smile.”

7. Be a human, not a robot.

Take a moment in your email/cover letter to say something I can relate to. “I am really interested in working with you because we share a love of great design.” Okay, so you are in fact human and you acknowledge that I am a person with similar interests. Maybe we would even get along!

Don’t be afraid to include you interests on your resume as well. They show that you lead an interesting life and are not as boring as your bullet points might make you sound.

8. Give your resume to two other people to proofread.

You are going to miss a typo. It doesn’t matter if you have super-human editing skills. Do yourself a favor: have two other people read over your resume and cover letter before you send them in. Inevitably, those people WILL find a typo that you missed. I guarantee it. A fresh pair of eyes can only end up helping, not hurting you.

9. Always provide your phone number.

If you actually care about getting the position you’re applying for, you’ll make it as easy as possible for me to contact you. If all you give is your email address, it appears that you don’t care enough about the position to be contacted in person. Always, always provide your phone number.

Start incorporating these nine professional resume tips into your resume right now. What can you improve?

1. Use the body of your email to sell yourself.
2. Send your resume as a PDF.
3. Name your resume like this:  “[First] [Last] Resume.pdf”
4. Use bold text to emphasize your most important points.
5. Include concrete actions and quantifiable results. Vagueness is a deal-breaker!
6. Include two or three quotes from good references.
7. Be a human, not a robot.
8. Give your resume to two other people to proofread.
9. Always provide your phone number.

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